A Matter of Class?

Mr and Mrs Andrews
​by Thomas Gainsborough, c.1850
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Another brilliant marriage? Yes! I think this would have been the prevailing answer of the people living in Bulmer Tye in 1850 if we had asked them that question. Thomas Gainsborough wouldn't have replied the same way and, to tell the truth, his answer is a very long way from being a yes. Naturally, following the code of polite behaviour of his time, Gainsborough could not declare this in words. Well, he did not need to, did he? To advertise his opinion not in words but in quite blunt a fashion he was in perfect command of equally effective devices- his skills with the brush and his colours. They were indeed powerful instruments to offend or to please. But, is it all that simple? Nothing ever is.
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​The painting is supposed to be a celebration piece to record the marriage of Robert and Frances Andrews a little over a year ago. To record? Yes. This is very unromantic a term when we imagine newly-married who are expected to be in love with and burning for each other, but it is exactly what is presented to us: the relationship is a business decision with the end that two very proud and well-known local families seal a deal on the extent of their estates and money by coming together in marriage. So, the commission Gainsborough got was very clear. The Andrews were not at all interested in a depiction of a picturesque and romantic narrative of love, surrounded by the beauty of nature that characterised the English landscape and hence their family properties. Robert and Frances were anything but, in fact. 

So, why not lowering one's standards and just doing what one has been told?  With the commission of the painting Gainsborough held the key to all the doors he wanted to pass through. Following the instructions should have been a simple matter for a genius like Thomas, right?
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Why could he not do it? When did Gainsborough's composure slip, I wonder? Was it the manner the Andrews issued their wishes? Was it seeing more and more wooden signs at the Andrews' estate gates that screamed "Private!" at him? Was Gainsborough envious and since envy is more often than not a same-sex activity, did he consider Robert Andrews as having an unfair advantage that couldn't be achieved by him? Robert's inheritance perhaps and his status that came along with it? Are the gun and the dog double entendres because Andrews never had to "hunt" for a wife and Gainsborough had? Well, we can only guess. On the other hand, as hypotheses and interpretations go, they are never completely off the wall. There must have been incidents between the Andrews and Gainsborough that made the painter react like this. Carefully planning a composition in paint takes time (unless your name is Jackson Pollock, of course). For Gainsborough however, who was known for painting fast with a spirit all brisk and fluent, there must have been a considerable amount of time to feed his grudge against the Andrews. Years maybe have passed before he dealt the couple a sweeping blow by creating a painting that would have astounded the neighbourhood for miles around if people had seen it. 

Let's have a look at Gainsborough's passionate displeasure and his way of fencing with the Andrews. 

The first little jibe that catches our eye is Gainsborough's positioning of the Andrews. Please look at the space and attachment to the landscape Gainsborough has allowed them to occupy in his painting. Or should I say detachment? The Andrews couldn't look more out of place and unwanted than they do here, could they? They are part of the painting and then they are absolutely not. Gainsborough's firm contour to outline the two figures, shoved to the leftmost side of the painting, denies them to blend into the panorama of a beautiful rural nature behind them and therefore into their own fairy tale. Furthermore, there is far too much landscape for one painting that is meant to be a portraiture. The landscape and the making of the trees are so dominating that the couple is not at one with the scene, Robert and Frances come second where they should come first. They appear like a disturbing factor on their own land and Gainsborough is not particularly subtle in communicating just that.

The Andrews are also not at one with one another and, warming up to his theme, we can almost see the strokes coming out of Gainsborough's brush like little darts. Stab, stab, stab. We see Mr Andrews in all his airiness and self-importance, quite carelessly dressed with his jacket undone, nonchalantly leaning against the tree. We expect a lady in a riding dress by his side, but we see a Mrs Andrews in a flamboyant pale blue dream of a gown that is so lovingly detailed that we can hear the rustling of her flowing silky skirt. Stifling formality against an overly casual attitude is a by Gainsborough intended paradox that, though with an exquisite painterly touch, gives the couple a rather comical appearance. Decidedly, Gainsborough liked the clothing more than he liked this two people wearing them and the Andrews didn't have his heart at all when they were parading themselves in front of him. 

Gainsborough did not flinch to highlight other feelings of his- the monotony and boredom people like the Andrews threw at him as a painter. When it came to portraits of couples Thomas Gainsborough painted most of them in a similar setting. I think he was able to paint the bench blindfolded and his message is a blatantly obvious "You waste my time but I want your money" statement. Strangely, Frances is wearing the same dress as her mother in "Mr and Mrs Carter", painted by Gainsborough c. 1747. No woman really, however much she loves her mum, would ever accept that. Why did Mrs Andrews? What was Gainsborough saying with this?

Robert Andrews' expression tells us he is quite satisfied with the situation. The marriage took place, tick in the box. He has a wife (with a fortune as well, not to forget) to present and run the household, tick in the box. He has a woman for his bed and a mother for his children, very much a tick in the box. But yet, I think there is something surprising in his figure. Gainsborough, albeit having a go at him and despising him as one who ruined the lives of the poor by taking away the land, gives Robert a much more sympathetic appeal than he offers Frances.

Is it Frances, then? Is she the reason why Gainsborough is lashing out like this? Yes, she is. Never before and never after this piece did Gainsborough paint a woman with such an expression on her face. Mrs Andrews is the one and only who gazes that puzzlingly unamiable at us, we won't find that look again in any of the other women in the whole of Gainsborough's art. Frances is not eighteen in this painting and, like Robert, Gainsborough knows her from childhood. Despite her youth and down to the her stiff and cold demeanour combined with ladylike deportment, she looks twice her age. Thomas Gainsborough did not like Mrs Andrews and her face tells us why. Frances exactly knows her value. Unfortunately, it is not the value of love. It is the value of money and it'll keep the marriage afloat. Gainsborough conveys his point and maybe it is a signal to his school friend Robert Andrews, one that proves its trueness whenever a man and a woman are concerned. We cannot pretend chemistry. We cannot pretend love. Feelings of love are very simple but strong and real emotions. And Gainsborough, knowing this, made this painting unbelievably charming and magical a treasure. It is love that constitutes the timeless power of this masterpiece .

Did the Andrews know? Did they know that, although the work strongly talks about love, there's none of it in the painting? Did they see that  the sparkling atmosphere Thomas Gainsborough was able to create like no other artist of his time is completely absent? Did the Andrews realise that, even though there are no furious brushstrokes at all and Gainsborough's play with light and details show him at his best already, the painter had worked himself into a gleeful outrage? Did they fear there were more uncomfortable specifiics to come if the Andrews allowed him to finish? Yes, they did. I believe it was exactly these details, Gainsborough's excessively accentuated barks of the trees and the dark clouds of the sky as a sign of a fateful prediction for example, that made the Andrews call off the contract. Gainsborough had broken their cool and Robert Andrews did nothing else than protecting his wife. Robert's decision is an aspect we have to consider for its considerably meaningful content, and it is a wonderful one at that if we think about it for a moment. 

And yet, I can't help thinking how even more beautiful the painting might have turned out if Gainsborough were given the chance to finish. Scratch the bravado and you will find deep sensitivity and vulnerability of a man who took painterly expression of feelings and life to an entirely new level is only beneath the surface. 

References: The photos were taken at the Kunsthalle Hamburg, 6 April 2018.